Chevrolet’s factory Corvette racing program goes into the 2002 season with tremendous optimism. The combination of top driving talent, highly developed racing cars, and a super skilled crew bode well for this year’s championship chase, which begins at Sebring on March 16.
    For those who have not been following the racing program, a little background is in order. GM decided to develop and campaign a road racing version of its C5 Corvette back in 1997. To carry out the plan, a coalition of GM engineers, managers, and technicians from various disciplines partnered with Pratt & Miller, an independent design, development, and fabrication business with a long history of success creating and racing cars and trucks.
    The racing car that resulted from the collaboration is called a C5-R. In keeping with the rules that govern the GTS class, which is where the C5-R competes, it is in essence a highly modified version of the regular street C5 Corvette. The C5-R starts life with production C5 hydro-formed frame rails and various other production parts, and to those are added a wide array of highly refined, custom fabricated components made from semi-exotic materials such as carbon composites, magnesium, beryllium, and titanium.

    After nearly a year of wind tunnel development and on-track testing, the two-car C5-R team made its debut at the Rolex 24 at Daytona in 1999. In the face of intense competition from an already successful three-car factory Dodge Viper team, the C5-Rs struggled at Daytona and through all of 1999 and into 2000. The Corvette won the GTS class for the first time at Texas Motor Speedway in September 2000.
     With renewed commitment from GM, and building on all they had learned during the previous two seasons, the C5-R team truly dominated in 2001. They won six out of eight American Le Mans Series races enroute to the ALMS

team and manufacturer championships, finished first overall and first and second in class at the Rolex 24 at Daytona, and finished first and second in class at the 24 Hours of Le Mans.

This Year’s Opposition

    The incredibly successful Dodge Vipers that dominated the Corvettes in 1999-2000 no longer pose a serious threat. Chrysler disbanded its factory team at the conclusion of 2000 and left future Viper racing to privateers. While they did have some limited success in Europe last year, none of the privately run Vipers competing on North American soil were competitive. To their credit, the American Viper Racing team continues to try but they are not expected to give the C5-Rs any real trouble throughout the season.
    Additionally, three European Viper teams will compete at Sebring. The Corvette squad has beaten all of these teams handily in the past, but if nothing else, they have the Corvettes outnumbered. In a 12-hour race, where there’s that much more time for attrition and bad luck, outnumbering the opposition can sometimes be a determining factor.
   Besides battling the Vipers, Chevy’s C5-Rs will face two Ferrari 550 Maranellos at Sebring. These gorgeous Italian thoroughbreds were only homologated for competition in ALMS at the end of last year and are something of an unknown commodity. A British team called Prodrive entered their 550 in the Petite Le Mans at Road Atlanta last October but dropped out almost immediately with mechanical difficulties, giving little hint at how fast they are capable of going.
  One of the two Maranellos entered at Sebring will be campaigned by Prodrive and the other will be run by Team Olive Garden. Both cars are expected to run the entire

ALMS schedule this year. They are definitely underdogs at Sebring in light of the Corvette Team’s intense level of preparedness but again, just about anything can happen in a 12 hour race.
     As in 2001, Corvette’s chief competition is expected to come from the Saleen S7R. Though failing to finish at both its first and second races, one of the Saleens stunned the racing world by winning GTS at last year’s Sebring contest. Campaigned by Konrad Motorsport, that same car went on to set numerous track records and beat the Corvettes at Laguna Seca in 2001.

   A total of four Saleens will compete at Sebring, including two entries from the Konrad team. While there is no denying that the Saleen S7R is inherently faster than the C5-R, the various teams and drivers running the Saleens have thus far been unable to keep pace with the P&M squad and Chevy’s all-star driver lineup.
   Konrad’s is probably the most capable of the three teams entered at Sebring, but it will compete without Oliver Gavin, one of its star pilots from last year. Ironically, Gavin left to join GM Racing and drive a Corvette.

New and Improved C5-R

    In addition to the Gavin, the #3 Corvette will have regulars Ron Fellows and Johnny O’Connell for the opener at Sebring. For the shorter ALMS races, where only two drivers are warranted, Fellows and O’Connell will get the call. As in the past, Andy Pilgrim, Kelly Collins, and Franck Freon will handle #4 at Sebring and the other long races, while only Pilgrim and Collins will pair up for the short races.
   The cars these expert drivers will be given in 2002 look nearly identical to those raced in 2001 and in fact they are almost the same. To remain competitive, however,all race programs must continuously evolve and the Corvettes have done exactly that.
    Perhaps the single biggest improvement to the car’s performance stems from aerodynamic advances developed in the wind tunnel and confirmed at track tests. Several very subtle changes to the nose section and front underbody have significantly improved balance, which translates to better handling and faster lap times.
    Also helping are new wheels and tires. OZ rims will replace the previously used BBS units and several new tires will augment those already utilized. Goodyear’s engineers and technicians put in a lot of time during Corvette Racing’s off-season and have come up with several new compounds and construction variants that will better enable them to choose tires specifically suited to conditions at particular tracks.
   As in past years, the C5-Rs will continue to rely on a 7-liter racing version of the production LS1 for motivation. Power is said to be up about 7 percent compared to last year as a result of relocated air intakes and several other induction refinements.
    In addition to improving the car’s performance, another way to achieve success is to improve driver performance. To that end, the engineers at P&M and
GM sought ways to make their drivers more comfortable behind the wheel. The most notable change to come out of this analysis is an improved seat. Besides being simply more comfortable, it offers the added benefits of better lateral support and increased impact protection to the driver in the event of an accident.
    All of these changes and more came out of an intense off season development program that saw, among other things, extensive on-track testing at Sebring last November and at Homestead’s road course in February.
    The huge investment of time, money, and hard work will soon be put to the only test that matters. Sebring is the crown jewel of American road racing and this year’s contest is made even more special by virtue of the fact that it’s the race’s 50^th anniversary. Though plagued by bad luck there in past years, team Corvette goes to Sebring with renewed optimism. All of their preparation, in concert with the small measure of luck that racers always need, should see them through to the checkered flag.